When it's 100 degrees out, and you've been working a while, you'll notice a change in your demeanor, and it's not toward being more pleasant. This is doubly true for hornets and yellowjackets, who love making nests on the hot sides of your tool shed and house, and hang their nests in inconvenient heights on tree limbs.

And why do they seem so cranky!? You're out there on your own property, you've tried to be nice, you've tried to live and let live, and then BAM! Your kid got stung just walking toward the pool.

It's tragic, and it happens every summer. And it gets much worse as the summer progresses. As the life cycle of the wasps and hornets that live in your yard draws to a close, there are lots of workers who aren't designed to survive the winter, and no longer have any work to do. As such, they naturally join gangs, harass local property owners, and generally turn into nogoodniks.

​Not so for the humble bee, who still has plenty of work to do, and just wishes these other vespids would quit giving "bees" a bad name. Our goal, when called to a stinging insect job, is to avoid bees, and only target yellowjackets, wasps, and hornets that would potentially be a liability if an allergic family member or passer-by were to be stung.

Remember that when you call, identify the enemy as "wasp" or "hornet," because we don't want to kill the bees. If you do have bees, we call a local apiarist to handle it for you.

There are natural predators of stinging insects. Check out this incredible picture we got of a robber fly that dwarfs a fairly large hornet. He had an incredibly large lunch that day. Imagine the largest hornet you've seen outdoors. That's how big the hornet in the picture above was. Now you can imagine how much bigger the fly was. After eating a meal that big, the fly wouldn't need any more for a while, which leaves us, your local pest control company, to make up the slack. It's a big burden we carry, but we care an awful lot.

The bane of everyone's picnic is, of course, the yellowjacket. They're not shy to invite themselves to any party where there's meat.

​Always after your corn on the cob and your steak, this disruptor can ruin everything quickly. And it's no fun for us, either, because even if you're on a program, they can come over from your neighbors' houses. That's why we recommend you call everyone in your neighborhood to get on our plan!

​Just remind them that quotes are free, and so is the call: 800.422.4803.